Like everything in Cloudpiercer Citadel, the Martial Path was a numbers game. Wealth and power were inexorably entwined. Money bought treasures and trainers and knowledge and techniques. The ranks of the Martial Corporations that ran the city were fat with acolytes from the Thousand-Year Families, their Paths fed by sacred pills and fadeborn essence and legacy techniques of untold power. And they, in turn, repaid their debt by diving the Fractured Realms for treasures, lending their mana to power the great factory and farm arrays that kept the city bountiful and strong, defending the honour of their corps in tournaments and skirmishes, and engaging in corporate espionage.
The corps dangled the possibility of power in front of the poor too, but in truth only those with exceptional talents could bridge that gap. Talents that translated to extreme value. There was a saying in the city: "mana is king." In Rix's experience, it was the greatest truth there was.
He'd never stood a chance. An orphaned boy from the Lantern District — the mortal slum that made up over half the city — he had neither the talent to justify any kind of investment, nor the resources to invest in himself. It took a System Seed to make someone a Martial Soul, connecting them to the System and allowing them to manipulate and forge mana. And System Seeds were a controlled commodity.
Rix had spent years thieving and hoarding and pursuing every path he could think of to get a seed for himself, but it quickly became apparent that the situation was rigged against him. The Martial Path required resources, making it a zero-sum game. Your gain was someone else's loss. In that environment, it didn't benefit the powerful to let too many people through the gates.
Gradually, he realised that a conventional approach would never work. He needed to go to extreme lengths to get what he wanted.
And so, here he was.
The other guard peeled off, leaving Scarface alone to shove Rix toward another room. Though sealed with a heavy lock, the room looked like a simple office. Two walls were lined with bookshelves stacked high with tomes and scrolls. In one corner was a bar cabinet laden with all sorts of lurid drinks in colours he couldn't imagine consuming. What drew his eyes, though, was the heavy wooden chair that sat alone against the room's far wall. Though it was plain in make, its solitary nature and the leather restraints that hung from the arms and legs lent it a certain menace. As he looked closer, Rix realised it was bolted to the floor.
That wasn't promising.
In the centre of the room, a man in white robes sat behind an ornate wooden desk. He was tall and slim, and he had the same ageless Martial Soul face as the guards, but there was silver speckling his long hair and a sour expression on his face. He looked like a bureaucrat, one of the countless people that pushed around the numbers that kept the city running. His attention was focused on a document before him. Another System Stone hovered nearby.
"Another dreg," said Scarface.
The silver-haired man's frown deepened, and he glanced up. "Six in one week."
"Mother's purse must be light," said Scarface.
The expression on the other man's face said how little he thought of that. "Put him in the chair."
Though Rix had been shoved and slapped, it was when Scarface's hand closed around his arm and began dragging him that he really felt the difference between them for the first time. The man's grip was like an iron manacle. Intractable. Rix was moved the way someone might carry a cup across a room — completely without effort.
Before he knew it, he'd been deposited into the chair, his limbs bound tight by the restraints. Despite the futility of it, he couldn't help but test his strength against them. They held firm, of course.
"They're for you, not us," said the white-robed man, shooting Rix a thin smile like he'd just told a joke. "This process can be painful. People thrash and hurt themselves."
The man stood and approached Rix, reaching out to take his chin in his hand, angling his face forward so he could study it. "Do you know who I am, boy?"
Rix shook his head.
"I'm the prison Steward."
Rix's eyes widened. This man was so unassuming. Could he really be one of the sacred Stewards? The Stewards were the administrators of the System's rules and regulations, and their nature was shrouded in mystery. Every Martial Corporation and Thousand-Year Family had one, though how somebody gained the role and exactly what they were capable of was unknown to Rix.
The man took the sheaf of papers from Scarface and flicked through them. "Zao Rixian. Prisoner 503. Mortal. One of my jobs here is to assimilate any mortals into the System, under System Licence 823B." The speech sounded well practised. "As part of that process you'll receive a System Seed that will give you access to mana to begin paying off your sentence."
Unlike prison sentences in some other places Rix had heard about, Spiritlock sentences were not measured in time served. Instead, they were measured in mana produced. While in mortal circles, people traded in coin, the martial economy was founded on heartstones, which were basically condensed mana. Not only were they a measure of value, but they were used to power many key parts of the city, from artefacts to arrays. This was one of the main reasons Spiritlock gave their inmates System access at all. There was little value in imprisoning mortals. But imprisoning people who could be compelled to literally produce wealth? Now that paid.
"Tomorrow, you will also bond your weapon and be given basic techniques so we can test your capability in combat," the Steward continued. "Should you prove yourself, you may be allowed to dive the Fractured Realm to further work off your debt to the city, for as long as you are able."
Rix furrowed his brow. "There's a test, sir?"
The Steward gave Rix a thin smile. "Not everyone has the qualities necessary to survive the Fractured Realms. Particularly the realm here. To throw fresh Whispers to the proverbial wolves without first testing your mettle would be bad business. All prisoners who arrive here as mortals are tested to ensure Spiritlock maximises their investment in you."
Rix nodded slowly. If there was a test, so be it. His life had been nothing but a series of trials. What was one more? "I'll be ready, sir."
The Steward studied him for a moment. The man's gaze was shrewd. Rix felt like he wasn't just being looked at, but into. "What were his results?" he asked Scarface.
The guard grinned. "What's that saying? 'A diamond in the rough'? Well, this one's all rough. Low potential, no bloodline. Though to hear him tell it, it doesn't matter. He's already plotting his ascension."
The Steward's lip curled ever so slightly in distaste. "Is that so?"
Rix stared back at them, defiant but silent. He'd already had one outburst, and he regretted it. Defending himself to these people would only serve to slow down the process.
Eventually, the Steward let out a sigh. "Despite what you might think, your game is obvious, boy, and it is neither unique nor clever. I know that out there in the depths of the city, people whisper that one can walk in here a mortal and walk out a Martial Soul. Thousands have entered my doors with that plan."
Heat rose to Rix's cheeks. It wasn't that he thought he was the first. It was just the ease with which he'd been read. The truth was, the Steward had the right of it. Rix was a criminal, but he'd been caught because he wanted to be. The crime he'd committed was engineered to land him in Spiritlock.
A place where everyone, regardless of station or potential, was made into a Martial Soul.
He shoved the embarrassment aside. Predictable or not, the plan had worked. That was what mattered.
"I didn't choose this road, sir," Rix said, meeting the man's eyes. There seemed little reason to deny it. "It was the only one left."
"And yet it doesn't go where you think." The Steward exhaled sharply. "While it's theoretically possible to exploit what Spiritlock has to offer, let me make the reality clear to you. In the fifty years I've been here, 99 percent of all prisoners who begin as mortals and dive our Fractured Realm die before completing their sentences."
Rix's jaw dropped. Back home, people said Spiritlock was a death sentence for most. After all, there was no way System access would be so easily given if you could just stroll out the other side. But a one percent survival rate was far lower than the rumours suggested.
"Even Martial Souls who arrive from the corps fall all the time in there," Scarface interjected. "Just a few weeks back we lost a Peak Spark from a Thousand-Year Family." He gave a respectful nod. "That woman was a sight to behold. A true monster in the arena, too. Even gave me a little pause." He dropped his voice, as though telling Rix a campfire story. "Can't imagine the fade that took her down."
The Steward shot Scarface a look, clearly unimpressed with his theatrics.
"But mortals do survive here," Rix said, a hint of uncertainty in his voice for the first time. "I met one."
The man had been named Kalo. He was a contact for the Porcelain Knives, the gang Rix had run with for a time. Some of them had known Kalo before he'd been imprisoned, when he was just another mortal on the street. When Rix had met him, he was definitely a Martial Soul. That encounter had been defining for Rix. It showed him that there were paths for people like him, even if they were fraught with danger. His whole plan had been born from that moment.
The Steward smiled grimly. "Ah yes, the survivors. Did you ask this person what their potential is?"
Rix shook his head slowly. In truth, he'd barely talked to Kalo. Most Martial Souls didn't interact with mortals unless they had a strong need, and certainly not mortal children. In Rix's mind, Kalo's survival was all the confirmation he needed. It proved that such a thing could be done.
"In the corporations," the Steward said, "disciples who have earned the right to be Martial Souls are given a series of elixirs to build their foundation before they start diving. While most mortals who come through our doors aren't worth such an investment, occasionally we see an exceptional case. Someone of High or Peak potential that slipped through the cracks. Almost all the survivors are from that pool."
"That's what that little test in the other room was about," added Scarface. "If you'd somehow revealed hidden depths, we might have seen fit to give you a little boost. Maybe give you a fighting chance. But alas," he spread his hands in mock helplessness, "you're every bit the dreg you look."
Rix's mind was racing. Everybody knew Martial Souls had their Paths augmented by alchemical concoctions. The treasures they harvested from the Fractured Realms were the key ingredients in this process. But he didn't realise they were considered so integral from day one.
"To be honest," the Steward said, "I find it deeply distasteful that the sanctity of the System — humanity's greatest gift — is sullied this way in pursuit of profit. It's sacrilege, and it gives false hope to those like you. If it were up to me, mortals without the potential to truly progress along the Martial Path would never be welcomed to the fold. But that's not my decision to make. I'm simply a facilitator. And you? You're just grist for the mill now, for however long you last."
There was no cruelty in his tone, just resigned certainty. In the Steward's mind, it wasn't a question of if he'd fall, but when. Rix wasn't prone to panic, yet in that moment he felt it rising in him, a cold ripple up his spine. This venture had always been something of a desperate gamble. Intentionally getting incarcerated was never going to be the start of a sensible plan. But he'd always just had the feeling he was meant to beat the odds. To deliver one small act of justice to a world that was so lacking in it.
Now it was starting to feel like all he'd done was doom himself to a quick and brutal end.
But then, as it always did, his mind found its way back to the oath he'd sworn, the oath that had anchored his every decision since childhood. Though not sworn to anything or anyone but himself, he'd sealed that promise in blood. It felt fitting somehow, blood for blood. He still bore the scar of it on his palm, a constant reminder of the duty he'd set himself.
In that oath, he found stillness. The odds didn't matter. Rix's dice had been cast long ago. He would be part of the one percent of this place, or he would die trying. His family deserved nothing less.
The Steward seemed to sense the change in Rix. His expression hardened. "Let's get this over with, then. I have paperwork."
The two men stepped back. Rix felt the air around him grow electric, and his eyes were drawn up to the wall his chair was pressed against. At even intervals in the stone, runes were now visible in an arch around his seated form. They glowed with a fey blue light. Though he couldn't decipher them, he knew at least the concept of what they represented. An array. A series of runes imbued with mana that could perform specific functions.
"Before giving you your System Seed, we must prepare your body to receive it. This array creates a mana bath. It will fill your body with mana, opening your dantian and your base meridians."
Rix's stomach dropped. This was a moment he'd been dreading, and it had come sooner than expected.
This was the place his whole plan could fall apart.
All he knew about the Martial Path he'd read in the Chronicles, and they were more concerned with theatricality and entertainment than information. The Martial Corporations and Thousand-Year Families kept an iron grip on much of the more intricate knowledge regarding their arts. Any advantage given to another could come back to bite you later.
What he knew to be true was that the System was the source of a Martial Soul's strength. An all-powerful gift from the heavens, the System fed the bodies of Martial Souls with mana and instilled in them the knowledge to wield it. And key to this was their spiritual network, their dantian and meridians.
This was a problem, because it clashed directly with a secret Rix was harbouring. The ace he kept up his sleeve.
He already had both.